Will Power won his third consecutive pole at Sonoma yesterday as he looks for his third consecutive win at the track and to extend his points lead over Ryan Hunter-Reay, Helio Castroneves and Scott Dixon. Ryan Briscoe will start second, Sebastien Bourdais and Castroneves make up row two. The Target Chip Ganassi Racing guys will start fifth and sixth, Dixon ahead of Franchitti.
Hunter-Reay just missed the Firestone Fast Six and will roll off from seventh with Alex Tagliani on row four as well. Simon Pagenaud will start ninth and James Hinchcliffe will round out the top ten. Justin Wilson qualified tenth but will have to serve a ten grid spot penalty for an engine change. Others serving penalties for engine changes are Sebastien Saavedra dating back to Indianapolis, he will betwenty-third on the grid, Takuma Sato, who is on his sixth engine this weekend, will start twenty-sixth and Simona de Silvestro will be on her seventh Lotus engine at Sonoma and will start twenty-seventh. Other notable drivers are Rubens Barrichello who will start eleventh, Marco Andretti and Graham Rahal will be twelfth and thirteenth respectively, Tony Kanaan is sixteenth, Oriol Servia is eighteenth and Charlie Kimball with start twentieth in his first race back from his hand injury.
Some Sonoma facts, this is the ninth race at Sonoma Raceway in the history of American Open-Wheel racing. The furthest a winner has come from is fifth, that was Scott Dixon in 2007. The last four races have been won from pole position. The first races were won from third position, Dan Gurney in 1970 and Tony Kanaan in 2005 and Marco Andretti won from second position in 2006.
Hopefully the changes to the race track will allow for more passing as they are attended to do so. Coverage for the GoPro Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma will begin at 4:00pm ET. Green flag will be around 4:42pm ET.
Covering All Motorsports. From Indianapolis to Le Mans, Daytona to Monaco.
